Swamp
| minerals_arcanus = Nightshade (common) | minerals_myrror = Nightshade (common) | change_terrain = | gaia's_blessing = No effect }} Swamp is a type of Terrain in the world of Master of Magic. Swamps are somewhat rare, and may appear either as isolated tiles amongst other terrain types, or in small concentrations. They are more common near the equator of either Plane. Contrary to the Game Manual and the tile yields reported by the Surveyor (F1), Swamp tiles do not contribute to the maximum production of a town in their vicinity. They produce nothing at all. This makes settlement near large tracts of Swamp undesirable. This oversight is only fixed in the unofficial 1.51 patch. On the other hand, Swamps often contain samples of the Nightshade plant, and more so on the plane of Myrror. Nightshade provides magical protection to towns in its vicinity - though such towns will need to develop slightly down the religious or intellectual building branches before this effect can be unlocked. Movement through Swamp tiles is more difficult for units due to the muddy ground, costing them 3 Movement Points to cross it. units may traverse Swamps as normal though, only spending 1 point. Construction of Roads in Swamp tiles is a long and arduous process, taking many turns. The spell will turn a Swamp tile into a Grassland tile, gaining a significant bonus to the Maximum Population of nearby towns. This spell cannot turn any tile into a Swamp, but there is no real reason to do so anyway. has no effect on the Swamp tiles adjacent to the affected town. Description In most regions, water that rains from the sky or arrives via river will also leave in one way or another. In some regions, water has no means of escape: it cannot penetrate deep enough into the ground, or does not evaporate quickly enough into the air. If the input of water is greater than the output, the region could easily turn into a Swamp. In a Swamp, the ground is absolutely saturated, and in many cases covered, with a layer of water that can be a few inches to many feet deep. The mud and dense vegetation make it hard to travel through this landscape, but both wildlife and plant life is abundant - if it can adjust to the competitive conditions. Swamps are generally inhospitable to humanoids. They present a very unstable soil for construction, and provide little space for any agriculture. Hunting is dangerous and difficult, and most of the plants do not rely on producing edible fruit (and if they do, it is often hard to reach and harvest). Furthermore, difficulty in traveling across the Swamp makes settlement troublesome at best. Geography Swamp tiles are much rarer than any other type of Terrain, on both the planes of Arcanus and Myrror. Swamp tiles will generally appear closer to the equator of these planes. Swamps are often sporadic, appearing as solitary tiles in the midst of other Terrain types. They may occasionally be encountered in larger concentrations, but this is rare. Town Development Swamp tiles are not helpful to nearby Towns at all, contributing nothing to their Maximum Population, output, or . There are two reasons to settle a town near Swamp tiles. First, they are prime candidates for , which turns them into highly-useful Grassland. The second reason would be to capitalize on Nightshade growing in the Swamp, but this plant does not exist in every Swamp tile and is relatively rare given the low number of Swamps appearing on the map. A town in the middle of a Swamped region may have trouble growing in size, and will have very poor ratings. Maximum Population : Both the game's Manual, and the Surveyor (F1) tool reports that a small can be gleaned by farmers from a Swamp, but this is not the case before the unofficial 1.51 patch. Instead, Swamp tiles have no available and grant no increase to Maximum Population prior to this fix. In other words, if a town were to be surrounded entirely by Swamp tiles, its Maximum Population would be exactly 0. This means that not only will the town not grow at all, but may actually lose a few citizens each turn. Fortunately, negative Population Growth cannot destroy a town (it will never drop below 1,000 population due to negative growth), but will likely never grow above 1,000 either. This makes Swamp areas very unfavourable for settlement. Maximum Population dictates the absolute maximum number of citizens a town can have. Once it reaches this many citizens, it will simply stop growing. This value also influences Population Growth: the larger the gap between the town's current- and Maximum Population, the faster the town grows. Furthermore, Maximum Population also determines how much can be produced in a town before inefficiency sets in. Once this limit of Food production is reached, additional citizens assigned to Farmer duty will produce much less - becoming less efficient. Higher Maximum Population means a higher production efficiency threshold, thus allowing more Farmers to be assigned while still retaining full efficiency. As a result, in a town inundated with Swamp, only a very small amount of can be produced even if all citizens are set to Farmer duty. It may struggle to produce enough food to feed itself - again resulting in negative Population Growth, and making it difficult to gain more than a few citizens. Common Minerals Swamp tiles have a good chance of containing Nightshade, and are the only location where this Mineral is found by default. On the plane of Myrror, Nightshade is even more abundant - and still found only in Swamps. Nightshade does not provide an immediate benefit to nearby Towns, but will start to work once a town builds either a Shrine or a Sages' Guild. Once this is accomplished, the town will enjoy the plant's magical protection: the Nightshade will automatically attempt to dispel any enemy spell cast directly on the town, its garrison troops, or the town's tile. Furthermore, it will keep attempting to dispel enemy Town Curses affecting the town, repeatedly, at the start of each and every turn. Towns placed near two or more Nightshade plants can be extremely difficult to affect with negative magic! Movement Swamp tiles are very difficult to navigate on foot. units lose 3 Movement Points when entering a Swamp tile. units treat Swamp tiles like any other tile. They take only 1 Movement Point to enter it. The same goes for units, they have much less trouble negotiating this treacherous terrain than a normal ground unit. Similarly, stacks that use movement (including Non-Corporeal units) can enter this tile for their usual cost of 0.5 Movement Points. units that do not have an alternative ability cannot enter Swamp tiles at all. The water is simply not deep enough for such units. Roads and Road Construction As with any land tile, Swamp tiles can be upgraded with a Road. This is done using Engineers, a type of unit that is only available to certain Races. Constructing a Road through a Swamp tile is a very difficult endeavour. A single unit of Engineers will need 8 turns to construct a Road on a Swamp tile. Each additional unit of Engineers reduces this by about 50% (rounded up). Therefore, 2 units will take 4 turns, 3 or 4 units will take 2 turns, and 5 or more units will take only 1 turn to build this road. Additional Engineers (beyond 5) do not speed this up any further. Dwarf Engineers work twice as fast as other Engineers. This means that a single such unit can complete a Road in a Swamp tile in only 4 turns, 2 Dwarf Engineers will take 2 turns, and 3 or more of them will be able to finish the construction by the following turn. Once a Road has been constructed, the cost to enter this Swamp tile changes to 0.5 for all units, regardless of their movement type. Note however that units may still not enter this tile, since they cannot move on land. If the road was constructed on Myrror, or affected by the spell, movement costs to enter this tile are completely removed for most units. In other words, and units can enter this tile without spending any movement points at all. However, Non-Corporeal units cannot use this special road, and will still require 0.5 Movement Points to enter the tile. Change Terrain The spell can be cast on any Swamp tile, turning it into fertile Grassland. This increases the tile's Maximum Population bonus to any nearby town to +1.5. This change causes no damage to any Nightshade plant present in the tile. Thus, a town located near Nightshade plants can utilize to make such tiles more productive than they originally are, without having to give up their magical protection. Change Tiles into Swamps cannot turn any type of tile into a Swamp. There should be no reason to do so anyway though, as Swamps are some of the least beneficial tiles, and the spell cannot generate any new Nightshade plants (which are the only real benefit of Swamps). Gaia's Blessing has no effect on the Swamp tiles near the enchanted town. It will not alter them in any way. Known Bugs As mentioned above, both the game documentation, and the in-game Surveyor (F1) report Swamps as producing , even though in the latest official version, they do not. This oversight is not resolved until the v1.51 patch (W607FIX.TXT), which finally brings the production of Swamp tiles in line with the documentation: they now do grant available. Category:Terrain Types